While playing Kotor 2, Steam version, I ran across an unusual glitch: on Onderon, when Ponlar's mob gets violent ("kill all the royalists!"), T3-M4 beeped out a response. His dialogue voiceover, however, was some alien voice.

Using the DLGEditor 2.3.2 I traced this to the file mp_ponla.dlg under 502OND_dlg.erf. T3's line has a VO_ResRef of 502mp_ponla037. After looking under StreamVoice, it appears that this sound file does not exist.

Next, I attempted each of the following fixes:

1) Changing mp_ponla.dlg's ResRef to AVO_t3m4ScarS (a T3-M4 sound file), and putting this in Override.
2) Taking that updated mp_ponla.dlg file along with the other files from 502OND_dlg.erf, creating a brand new ERF using the Kotor tool, and putting that in Override.
3) Taking the aforementioned ERF and putting it straight into Modules, swapping it for the vanilla file (and removing my previous attempts from Override).
4) Using the vanilla mp_ponla.dlg and creating a 502mp_ponla037 (the missing T3 sound file), copied from another T3 file, and putting this in StreamVoice->502->MP_PONLA.

None of the above worked. For each of these attempts I would load one of my earlier saves, but I would still get the weird alien voice from T3 when things with Ponlar turned violent. I tried using saves from when I first arrived on Onderon, i.e. before setting foot in module 502. Once I even tried using a save from Dxun immediately before leaving for Onderon, but still no luck.

Is this expected behavior? If I started a new game, would this be solved once I arrive at Onderon? Do save files somehow cache modules that your player has visited? On #3 above, even replacing the 502OND_dlg.erf straight in the Modules folder had no apparent effect. I would appreciate any insights.

Or perhaps the problem lies with the coreward databases, which are notoriously spotty…

Ok, this is now solved. The problem was not with VO_ResRef at all, but rather AlienRaceNode. It was set to 2. Changing it to 21 (which corresponds to the T3 row in alienvo.2da) and putting the modified .dlg into override fixed this.

Don't get me wrong, I love the TSLRCM, but I like playing both versions. There are a few places throughout the game where I prefer the dialogue/pacing of the vanilla version. So, as much as I enjoy the restored content mod and its many bug fixes, I still alternate between vanilla/restored content depending on what I'm in the mood for.

The restored jedi enclave scene comes to mind, where the vanilla dialogue just seems more concise/emotionally effective than what the TSLRCM adds back in. And there are a few other minor things. But note that I haven't played the TSLRCM since version 1.7, so I don't know if all of this holds true for the most recent version.

Strangely enough, on my old CD version of the game, I never encountered many of these bugs (I had the UK version for some reason), so I'm trying to make vanilla Kotor 2 as bug-free as possible.